Republican Dana Rohrabacher a US lawmaker critical of President Hamid Karzai was barred from entering Afghanistan as part of a congressional delegation meeting with Afghan opposition leaders, his office said Monday.

U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-California, told Security Clearance he was readying to travel with five other Republicans from Dubai to Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, when the State Department requested he stay behind.

Rohrabacher, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, has been a vocal critic of the “corrupt Karzai government and the US failed strategy of foisting a western-style democracy from a central government in Kabul,” his communications director Tara Setmayer told AFP.

Rohrabacher was part of a six-person delegation led by Texas Congressman Louie Gohmert. The group planned the trip to meet with the leaders from the Northern Alliance, a group that worked with U.S. forces to remove the Taliban from power after Sept. 11, and has since struggled for more power under Karzai.

While Rohrabacher visited with local officials in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the rest of the team—which included Texas Rep. Michael Burgess, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, Texas Rep. John Carter and Guam Rep. Madeleine Bordallo—went ahead to Afghanistan to meet with the Northern Alliance.

In the meantime Afghan Foreign Affairs Ministry criticized the recent meeting of the US congress members with the Afghan opposition leaders where a change of the current political system was dicussed during the meeting.

Janan Mosazai Foreing Affairs Ministry spokesman on Monday told reporters decisions by foreigners is considered to be interference in Afghan internal affairs